Five killed as helicopter crashes in outskirts of Istanbul

The private Dogan news agency said the helicopter, with two pilots, four foreign nationals and a Turkish citizen on board, crashed on the side of a highway in Istanbul’s Buyukcekmece district.

A helicopter crashed in the outskirts of Istanbul on Friday after apparently hitting a television tower in dense fog, killing at least five people, reports said.

The private Dogan news agency said the helicopter, with two pilots, four foreign nationals and a Turkish citizen on board, crashed on the side of a highway in Istanbul’s Buyukcekmece district.

The district’s mayor, Hasan Akgun, told private NTV television that he saw five bodies at the site of the crash. Pieces of the helicopter were scattered on the highway as well as a green area on the side of the road.

Eyewitness Fikret Karatekin, a taxi driver, told CNN-Turk television by telephone that the helicopter crashed into the tower before crashing on the highway. “It hit the tower and crashed by spinning,” he said, adding that the highway had been closed down.